At sight of me my new acquaintance rose from her seat, and began curling
up the corner of her apron.
"Do you know," I said, "that this house bears the reputation of
being haunted?"
"I have heard people say it is, sir," she answered.
"And do you know that servants will not stay in it--that tenants will
not occupy it?"
"I have heard so, sir," she answered once again.
"Then what do you mean by offering to come?" I inquired.
She looked up into my face, and I saw the tears come softly stealing
into her eyes, and her mouth began to pucker, ere, drooping her head,
she replied:
"Sir, just three months ago, come the twentieth, I was a happy woman. I
had a good husband and a tidy home. There was not a lady in the land I
would have changed places with. But that night, my man, coming home in a
fog, fell into the river and was drowned. It was a week before they
found him, and all the time--while I had been hoping to hear his step
every minute in the day--I was a widow."
"Poor soul!" I said, involuntarily.
"Well, sir, when a man goes, all goes. I have done my best, but still I
have not been able to feed my children--his children--properly, and the
sight of their poor pinched faces breaks my heart, it do, sir," and she
burst out sobbing.
"And so, I suppose," I remarked, "you thought you would face this house
rather than poverty?"
"Yes, sir. I heard the neighbours talking about this place, and you,
sir, and I made up my mind to come and ask if I mightn't tidy up things
a bit for you, sir. I was a servant, sir, before I married, and I'd be
so thankful."
Well, to cut the affair shorter for the reader than I was able to do for
myself, I gave her half a crown, and told her I would think over her
proposal, and let her hear from me--which I did. I told her she might
come for a couple of hours each morning, and a couple each evening, and
she could bring one of the children with her if she thought she was
likely to find the place lonely.
I would not let her come in the day-time, because, in the quest I
had set myself, it was needful I should feel assured no person could
have an opportunity of elaborating any scheme for frightening me, on
the premises.
"Real ghosts," said I to Mr. Craven, "I do not mind; but the physical
agencies which may produce ghosts, I would rather avoid." Acting on
which principle I always remained in the house while Mrs. Stott--my
charwoman was so named--cleaned, and cooked, and boiled, and put
things straight.
No one can imagine what a revolution this woman effected in my ways and
habits, and in the ways and habits of the Uninhabited House.
Tradesmen called for orders. The butcher's boy came whistling down the
lane to deliver the rump-steak or mutton-chop I had decided on for
dinner; the greengrocer delivered his vegetables; the cheesemonger took
solemn affidavit concerning the freshness of his stale eggs and the
superior quality of a curious article which he called country butter,
and declared came from a particular dairy famed for the excellence of
its produce; the milkman's yahoo sounded cheerfully in the morning
hours; and the letter-box was filled with cards from all sorts and
descriptions of people--from laundresses to wine merchants, from
gardeners to undertakers.
The doors now never shut nor opened of their own accord. A great peace
seemed to have settled over River Hall.
It was all too peaceful, in fact. I had gone to the place to hunt a
ghost, and not even the ghost of a ghost seemed inclined to reveal
itself to me.